Her Mistletoe Miracle

He landed near the park’s two smaller helicopters. Wingman got antsy waiting for the rotors to stop. Mick saw why. They were being greeted by the house dogs, a German shepherd and a good-size collie. Mick released his dog but attached a leash to his collar.

Trudy hurried down the path that led to the buildings. From her hand motions, Mick deduced that she intended to pen her dogs. He waited to open the door until she’d disappeared again.

“I know, buddy, you’re disappointed to lose playmates. But maybe those dogs aren’t as friendly as you. Come on. I’ll walk you into the woods to do your business. Then you’ll have to stay in the chopper while I unload Morgenthal’s order.”

Trudy reappeared about the time Mick returned to the clearing. “Where should I stack all the boxes?” he asked.

“My husband and sons and our other rangers are making sure all of the campers have left. They’ll be closing this end of the park and putting up chains across the entry roads until next season. Would it be a terrible imposition if I asked you to carry the paper goods to the canopy we’ve set up for the potluck? Put everything else on the porch. I don’t want you rein-juring your leg. Wylie told us about your surgery. In a way, that was his good fortune. Otherwise he wouldn’t have met your sister.”

“Wylie’s right. Marlee never would’ve taken over my cargo route if I hadn’t been laid up. It’s no problem moving your stuff, Trudy. I have a hand truck I can load boxes on.”

Trudy talked incessantly as Mick loaded up cartons and trucked them around. He would’ve told her he’d see her the next day, as he’d been invited to the potluck, but couldn’t get a word in edgewise.

“Phew, Wingman,” Mick said after he’d buckled himself back in his seat. “That woman could talk the ears off a mule. I suppose she gets lonely stuck out here with her husband out tending the park.”

He slipped on his earphones and promptly turned his thoughts to his next delivery. Mick wondered if he’d see Hana Egan this trip. A new kind of excitement rose in him, different from the thrill he got from flying. A month ago when he’d delivered the bulk of the winter supplies to Captain Martin, who lived year-round at the smoke jumpers’ camp, Mick had managed a few words with Hana. She wasn’t real talkative, and sometimes he had to cajole information out of her. She’d said she’d be going home to California soon.

As he rose above the stand of timber marking the northernmost park entrance, Mick considered how little he knew about Hana. He knew he was drawn by her red-gold curls that snapped to life when she stood bareheaded in the sun. He liked the freckles dusted across her nose. Mick probably thought too much about kissing her shapely mouth, since odds of that happening weren’t high. He’d never seen her wear lipstick. Of all her attributes, Mick found Hana’s eyes to be her most arresting feature. Given her coloring, a person might expect her to have blue or green eyes, but hers were…gold. Whiskey gold. He’d spoken with her enough to decide that her eyes reflected her every emotion.

Time passed quickly. The smoke jumpers’ camp sat halfway between the ranger station and his sister’s house. The place looked pretty deserted. He recognized Leonard Martin’s battered Ford diesel truck, and the assistant’s slightly newer SUV. The Jeep belonged to Jess Hargitay. As a rule, smoke jumpers flew in from various camps during times of fire. But Jess drove in. This station was the seasonal home to maybe six men and women. And the season was at an end, Mick lamented as he landed.

Heck, maybe he’d find out where Hana lived in California. He’d been thinking of island vacations, but California had plenty of white sandy beaches.

He repeated the process he’d gone through at the ranger station. He let the rotors stop fully before he leashed Wingman and the two of them climbed out.

“Hi, Mick.”

Hana Egan’s sweet voice had him spinning too fast on his fancy titanium hip. Mick felt a deep pain buckle his newly healed muscles. A blistering swear word escaped before he could check himself. He dropped Wingman’s leash when he was forced to grab the upright strut on the landing skid to keep from toppling.

The petite woman was quick on her feet. She scooped up the fleeing dog’s leather leash. “I didn’t mean to surprise you, Mick. Are you okay?” Those whiskey gold eyes Mick had so recently been thinking about turned dusky with concern.

“I’m fine,” he growled. The last thing he wanted was for Hana to judge him a lesser man than Jess Hargitay, who was swaggering toward them. Smoke jumpers tended to be agile, tough and have a penchant for danger.

“You don’t act fine,” she said. “Why can’t men ever admit to any shortcomings?”

He tried to discreetly knead the kink out of the long muscle that ran down his thigh. He hadn’t limped in a month, but he limped now as he crossed the space between them and relieved her of Wingman’s leash. “I wouldn’t touch that comment with rubber gloves, Hana. Suffice it to say, must be a guy thing. But I can’t answer for all men.” He looped the dog’s leash through a cross tube at the rear of the landing skid. “I probably need to ask Jess where he wants me to stack his supplies.” Still smarting from her words—and the cramp in his leg—Mick lowered his chin in dismissal and started to walk around her.

“Hold on.” She touched his hand, then abruptly pulled back. “I saw you dropping down to land, and I hurried over here to catch you before anyone else butts in. I wanted to tell you goodbye, Mick.”

“You’re taking off for home today, then?” He halted in his tracks and idly rubbed at his hand, still feeling the rasp of her surprisingly callused palm. Although, considering the job she did, Mick didn’t know why he’d be shocked to find her hand wasn’t nearly as soft as it looked.

“As soon as six of us finish climbing Mt. St. Nicholas, we’ll split up and go our separate ways.”

“You heard there’s a front moving in?”

“I’m sure Jess scoped out the weather. We’re making the climb for fun. It’s been a rough summer with fire after fire. This is our last hurrah as a unit before we scatter for the winter.”

“Huh. So you aren’t all from the same place?”

“No.” The denial was accompanied by a crisp shake of her red curls.

“I imagine you’re anxious to get home to your family, what with the holidays around the bend.”

Mick noticed that a brittleness overtook her usually friendly demeanor. Had he crossed some kind of line? Granted, in the past they’d never got around to discussing anything personal.

“I struck out on my own at sixteen, Mick,” she said briskly. “I took three part-time jobs so I could graduate from high school. Before that I was shuffled through a lot of different homes. There’s none I’d remotely call family.”

“So you were, what? In foster care?”

“Care? If you say so.” She spat the word with distaste. “I hope that’s not pity in your eyes, Mick Callen. I’ve done fine. This winter I’m enrolling in a couple of courses at UCLA. One day I’ll have my degree in forestry.” She followed that with a halfhearted laugh. “I’m surprised Jess hasn’t regaled you with the fact that I’m UCLA’s oldest underclassman. But I think I should qualify as a junior this semester.”

Mick felt her underlying anxiety over baring so much of her soul. He usually played things cool, too, when it came to spilling his guts. Now he felt moved to share. “This past spring my grandfather died. Pappy. You probably heard about it.”

“I did. Mick, I’m so sorry. You know he bragged about you something fierce. You must miss him terribly.”

“Yeah. I rattle around the house.” Mick dug deep to keep his voice from breaking. It was one thing to share a private grief, and another to show weakness.

“I heard your sister married Wylie Ames. Gosh, does that mean you’re totally alone this holiday season?”

“Marlee and Wylie want me to spend a week with them at Thanksgiving. I probably will if I haven’t winged my way to a sandy beach in some warmer clime. Their baby’s due right around Christmas, and they’ll have a house full with Jo Beth’s grandmother coming to help with the baby. Especially if weather forces the midwife to bunk over.”

Mick thought Hana’s eyes looked wistful as she said eagerly, “They’re having a baby? I can’t believe you’d want to miss that.”

“I wouldn’t have a clue what to do around a newborn. By the time I come back in the spring, the kid’ll be sitting up and there’ll be something substantial to hang on to. They don’t live far from here, Hana. Maybe if you’re not off fighting a fire, I’ll swing by and take you to see the baby, since you sound keen on little kids.”

She gazed beyond him into the distance, and an awkwardness fell between them. “Uh…maybe.”

“My sister wouldn’t mind. You’ll be back here next spring, right?”

She lifted one slender shoulder and Mick’s heart slammed hard up into his throat at the very possibility that she might not be coming back to Montana.

Wingman started racing around and bounding to the end of his leash, barking his head off. A long shadow fell across the couple. A muscular, dark-haired man wearing a frank scowl strode up and shouldered Mick aside.

“Hana, what’s taking so long? Kari said you came to collect our supplies from Mick. Everything else is loaded in my Jeep. Come on, you’re holding us up. I want to make camp at the fir tree break in time to pitch tents for the night.”

Hana didn’t respond to Jess Hargitay’s order.

Mick felt tension drawing tight as if there were a power struggle between the two. Wanting to intercede, Mick tapped Jess on the back. “Cloud Chasers’ office manager said you’d pay cash for this load, Hargitay.” Mick dug a wadded-up charge slip from his shirt pocket and shoved it none too gently against Jess’s chest. “Soon as you cough up the dinero, I’ll haul these supplies to your Jeep.”

There had never been any love lost between the two men who glared at each other now. The dislike had existed before Hana, but intensified whenever Jess caught them talking.

Always cocky and sure of himself, Jess brushed off Mick’s hand. Locking eyes with the pilot, he reached out in a too-familiar manner and filtered his fingers through Hana’s curls. “Hey, babe, I’m kinda short this month. Run back and pass the hat among the rest of our climbers. I’m supplying the wheels and gas to get to the site. The least all of you can do is spring for food, canned heat and long johns.”

Hana opened her mouth as if to refuse. Instead, she moved her head and ducked under the thickly muscled arm, and murmured a final farewell to Mick.

The air crackled in her wake. Neither man spoke, but they continued to take each other’s measure until tall, beanpole thin Kari Dombroski loped up to hand Mick a collection of bills and coins.

He stuffed the money in his pocket without counting it. Brushing past Jess, Mick pulled the supplies out of the Huey.

As if to keep Mick from seeing Hana again, Jess relieved him of most of the load, except for the small stuff, which he snarled at Kari to grab.

Wingman lunged at the end of his leash to bark at Jess, and Mick turned his back on the smoke jumpers and bent to calm the dog. “Nice guy, huh, pooch?” he muttered. “If you could talk, I’d ask you what in hell Hana sees in that jackass.”

The dog whined and licked his face as Mick untied him and hoisted him into the chopper. Before Mick had his harness and the dog’s fastened, the mottled black Jeep kicked up dust farther down the dirt road.

As he lifted off, Mick noted with interest that he and Jess were both headed toward dark clouds building over the mountain range.

He tried not to think of petite Hana Egan climbing craggy ridges topped by snow and already shrouded in a thickening gray mist.

To distract himself, he projected his worry onto Saturday’s potluck. What if the wind was the first taste of the Canadian storm? If it got so bad the party was cancelled, Marlee would be devastated. Oh, his sister made noises about not wanting to attend, but Mick had seen right through her. She wanted the day to be perfect. And Mick wanted that for her, too. She and Wylie deserved to kick back a bit after nursing Dean, Wylie’s son, through Burkitt’s lymphoma last winter. Between worry over Dean, and Pappy’s funeral not long on the heels of Dean’s remission, the whole family needed a bit of fun.

CHAPTER TWO

PINE NEEDLES BLEW out from under the Huey as Mick set the lumbering chopper down on Wylie’s private runway. Mick sat and admired the handsome six-seat turbo prop Merlin housed under an open shed to the left of the runway. He had helped his brother-in-law buy the plane as a surprise for his bride. Wylie had said Marlee had cried happily when she saw it.

When Mick had told Pappy, he’d merely laughed and said he’d known all along that any woman born a Callen would consider a plane an appropriate wedding gift.

Mick thought any woman who lived in remote Montana would think it an excellent gift. But then, he was more practical than sentimental. When he was a kid, this part of Montana was so sparsely settled, ranchers, hunters and the few recreational-sport lodge owners were dependent on small planes to fly them out in an emergency. That was still true, but to a lesser degree. Now, land was being cleared right and left. Whole towns had sprung up in areas where there used to be nothing but forest.

Mick, who was far from a recluse, nevertheless wasn’t sure how he felt about all the growth. But old trail blazers like his grandfather and Finn Glenroe were either dying off or they were selling out to developers. Two weeks ago he’d heard that Finn and Mary, who’d run the isolated Glenroe Fishing Lodge for as long as Mick could remember, had accepted a buyout because Finn’s arthritis had gotten so bad.

Since arriving home to nurse his war wounds, Mick had watched resort developers salivate over Finn’s land. The same outfits sniffed around Cloud Chasers. The day after Pappy’s funeral, Mick received three phone offers on the property. Land grabbers were worse than vultures in Mick’s opinion. Pappy would turn over in his grave if Mick were to sell. And yet…

Refusing to let himself get maudlin again, he took off his earphones in time to hear the last sound of the rotors. No wobble with any of his landings. Replacing the main hub and the lubricant must have done the trick.

“Uncle Mick, Uncle Mick!” He heard his niece, Jo Beth’s, excited cry the minute he cracked the forward door. It was followed by Dean’s whoop and Piston’s wild barking, which prompted a response in kind from Wingman.

Mick unbuckled the wiggling dog from his harness and lifted him down before climbing from the cockpit himself.

Scooping up the dark-haired girl waiting to be hugged, he marveled again at the change a year and acquiring a brother and new dad had wrought on the formerly unhappy girl. Jo Beth, now six, had been pouty and prone to tantrums when Marlee first moved home after the death of her first husband.

His twin had served two tours in the Gulf, supporting the family while Jo Beth’s dad wasted away from lymphoma. Even though Marlee had fallen hard for Wylie Ames, when his son had been diagnosed with a different form of lymph cancer, Marlee had had a rough patch where she almost walked away from love. Surprisingly, Jo Beth handled Dean’s illness better than her mother. The girl never wavered in her belief that her friend would recover. And now his cancer was in remission, and doctors expected it to last.

At the moment Dean looked the picture of health. The boy laughed in delight at being mobbed by the two cavorting dogs—dogs similar in size, and looking enough alike to have common parents, which was possible since they had come from the same shelter only months apart.

“Wingman remembers me,” Dean said, his freckled face split in a wide grin.

“He does at that.” Mick reached down and ruffled the boy’s red hair. “You’re looking good, my man.”

“I grew an inch, too,” the boy boasted. “The doctor told Mom that was excellent news.”

“It sure sounds good to me! So, where are your folks?” Whenever Mick had come to visit, one or the other parent accompanied the kids to the airstrip.

Jo Beth pointed. “Mama’s in the kitchen saying words Grandmother Rose wouldn’t like one bit.”

Jo Beth’s paternal grandmother had practically raised Jo Beth until Marlee, a navy lieutenant, was discharged. That was another traumatic time for his sister. Not long after her husband, Cole’s, death, Rose had petitioned family court for custody of Jo Beth. Mick thought it a testament to his sister’s forgiving nature that for her daughter’s sake, his twin had patched the rift with her former mother-in-law.

“I thought your mom baked pies yesterday. Don’t tell me she’s swearing over fixing me lunch? Granted, I’ve had nothing but coffee today, so I could eat a mule raw. Maybe I’ll settle for nibbling on you.” Mick made growly noises as he teasingly went after his niece’s bony shoulder.

She giggled and shrieked until Mick set her down. “Mama’s not baking pies, Uncle Mick. She made supper for tomorrow, and had it in a pan when she ’membered a ’portant in…gredient.” The girl stumbled in her attempt to explain.

“Ouch, no wonder she’s saying bad words. Where’s Wylie?”

“Dad’s out taking inventory of the campsites in his area,” Dean said. “Sometimes campers steal fire grates, or mess up the trash barrels at the end of camping season. He has to make a list of the sites that need stuff stocked before the park opens in the spring. I usually help tie tarps over the leftover firewood so it stays dry for the winter,” the nine-year-old said proudly. “Dad knew you were coming, so he let me stay home to help you unload Mom’s supplies. He said she’s not allowed to pick up anything over five pounds.”

“I never turn down help, Dean. Somewhere in this monster, I believe you’ll find Halloween treats for two kids who tote boxes to the house.”

“Yippee!” the kids yelled out, setting the dogs off again.

Marlee hurried down the path to see what was going on. Her usually well-kept blond hair looked a fright. And at seven months pregnant, she barely fit into the men’s plaid flannel shirt that stretched over her bulging middle.

Mick was shocked to see her waddle more than walk out on the asphalt. Last time he’d stopped in to visit, his sister was just starting to show.

“Wow, sis, you look like the pregnant guppy Mrs. Walters brought to our sixth grade science class. Didn’t we name her Fatso?”

“Thank you, Mick.” Marlee’s blue-green eyes narrowed ominously. She snapped his arm hard with a dishtowel she’d used to wipe what looked like blood off her hands. When he stopped trying to evade her, Mick saw it was tomato sauce.

“I’m sorry.” He apologized even as he and the kids laughed over her antics. “Honestly, Marlee, you’d better have a look-see in the mirror before Wylie gets home, or he’ll beg me to take you back. No offense, but you look like hell. Okay, okay, Jo Beth! I know I said a bad word.”

Since her grandmother had drilled into her head that swearing was unacceptable, Jo Beth rarely failed to point out Mick’s indiscretions. Or Pappy’s when he was alive.

“Spoken like a bachelor. Maybe your girlfriends are fashion plates,” Marlee said, her lip quivering, “but this past month I’ve passed the point of getting into anything in my closet. Tell me you have freight from Mervyn’s Online or I’ll die. I ordered maternity clothes, and if they didn’t come you’ll be going to the potluck tomorrow without me.” She burst into tears, further shocking Mick.

“I have them…your order,” he said, trying to rectify his error of saying how awful she looked by awkwardly patting her. “Jeez, Marlee, I was teasing.”

“It’s okay.” She smothered her face in the sauce-streaked towel, which made matters worse. “Hormones gone berserk, I guess. I swear I didn’t do this with my first pregnancy.”

“Is it normal? I mean, is everything okay?” Mick asked worriedly. “When did you last see a doctor?”

“When she flew me to Seattle for my checkup,” Dean said, again corralling the boisterous dogs. “My dad told me and Jo Beth that’s how women who are gonna have babies get.”

“No kidding?” Mick frowned into one upturned face, then the other. The kids didn’t seem all that positive they shouldn’t be doing something to help.

“If Wylie said it, sport, it must be true. Let’s give your mom some space. Come on, kids, it’s getting colder. Help me haul this freight in.” He flung open the door that led to the Huey’s dark belly, levered himself into the cavern and began handing out the smallest cartons.

“The Polly Pocket amusement park I wanted! Is this my Halloween treat, Uncle Mick?”

“Jo Beth,” Dean exclaimed, running excitedly over to his stepsiste, “Uncle Mick gave me the scary black knight and castle I’ve been asking Dad for.”

Marlee managed to wipe most of her tears away, but left bits of tomato sauce smeared across her cheeks. “Mick, you spoil the kids. Last time you came you brought half a toy store. I told you to stop already.”

“What are bachelor uncles for? Or bachelor brothers…? On my last trip to Missoula, I found some perfume to replace the bottle I broke when we moved you here. A clerk also helped me with stuff for the baby. Let’s go up to the house. After you clean up, you can open boxes to your heart’s content.”

“What’ll be left to give us when you come for Christmas?”

Her brother jumped down gingerly, and pulled a stack of various-size boxes into his arms before he shut the cargo door. “Uh, I’m thinking of taking off for parts unknown after Thanksgiving. I thought I’d find me a warm spot to ride out winter. Maybe I’ll go before Turkey Day. Stella said she’ll watch the house.”

“Mick!” Marlee couldn’t hide her disappointment. “You need family your first holiday without Pappy. Losing him was worse for you than me. I came home almost a stranger after being gone ten years. You gave him reason to live as long as he did.”

Mick stared toward the mountains. “I keep expecting him to come out for breakfast or to find him puttering in the workshop. It’s hard.”

“I understand. After Cole died I felt like running away. Only, I had Jo Beth. But…you have us, Mick.”

“I know,” he said, dropping back to match his long stride to her waddle. He stopped on the path when the top box threatened to fall. “Will you grab that. I think it’s your perfume. I’d hate to break a second bottle.”

She took the package. “Talk to me, Mick. It’s not good to hold your feelings inside. We’re twins. There was a time we shared all our hopes and dreams… and sorrows.”

“Back then our dreams were one and the same. To fly for the navy. It’s all either of us ever wanted. Now… Life’s a bitch sometimes.”

“So, your wanting to get away at Christmas has to do with…losing your career? It’s been six years, Mick. You rebuilt Cloud Chasers after Pappy let it slip, and it’s a great success. And who’ll fly mercy missions over the winter if you up and take off? To borrow Dean’s term, you’re Angel Fleet’s best sky knight.”

“Sky knight.” Mick snorted.

“Apt. I overheard the kids talking on a flight to Seattle for Dean. Jo Beth bragged that she and I were sky angels. Wylie had just told us about a girl Angel Fleet asked you to fly out for a kidney transplant. Dean said angel sounded too girly for you. He’s so into the knights and castles toys. He officially dubbed you Sky Knight.”

They’d reached the house and Mick was saved from commenting. He was a volunteer flyer. Why gussy up his role? The coordinators of Angel Fleet raised funds to keep flights free or nearly so for needy sick and injured people living in remote locations. The staff were the real knights.

The kids had dumped their boxes on the kitchen table, and were in the living room ripping open their new toys. Both dogs had flopped in front of a fireplace that had been laid with kindling and firewood, but not lit.

Mick hadn’t bought only the black knight and Polly Pocket sets for the children; he’d piled on a board game he knew they’d like, and books and music CDs. Wylie didn’t have TV reception, although Mick knew he was considering installing a satellite dish.